All three candidates will be speaking Saturday morning at the Omni Hotel starting at 9 a.m.

The Cruz campaign was the first to claim endorsements from the group of influential Republican women, releasing a list of over 100 names they said “are formally endorsing Ted Cruz.”

“They [TFRW] are the largest and most effective grassroots organization within the Texas Republican Party,” said James Bernson, the Cruz campaign’s communications director. “If you want to win a Republican primary in Texas, you have to have TFRW members on your team.”

Although the majority of the women on Cruz’s list did in fact support him, a check of the list found five who said they do not endorse Cruz and are still undecided on which candidate they will support.

“I don’t have a horse in that race at this time,” said Mollie Herrington, a member of the Smith County TFRW group. “I am pleased with all the candidates right now and I think they will all do a great job.”

Tom Leppert (AP photo)

Three others asked the Cruz campaign to remove their names, citing rules which prohibit club presidents and other district officials from publicly endorsing a candidate until a nominee is chosen.

Shirley Cooper of the Alamo City Republican Women said she asked to have her name removed from the list of supporters at least two weeks ago.

“It’s just a formality because of my position as campaign activity chairman,” Cooper said. “I have to be neutral in a contested race.”

Ten other women did not know about the list of supporters and could only guess at how their names ended up on it. Others said they thought campaign contributions could have been criteria for the list.

Dewhurst spokesman Dave Beckwith said he anticipates growing support from the TFRW and NFRW, a group of at least 10,000 members combined.

“We realize we’ve gotten a late start,” Beckwith said. “But we anticipate support from hundreds, even thousands of TFRW members.”

Bernson brushed off the removal of some TFRW names from Cruz’s list. He said the longer list of TFRW supporters for the Cruz campaign after years of Dewhurst’s presence in Texas politics is indicative of a shift in Republican women’s support for Cruz.

“Dewhurst has a decade of working with TFRW and he doesn’t have nearly as many [endorsements],” he said. “We’re proud of what we put together.”